


always in my headspace

by orphan_account



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Adam is mentioned, F/M, Female Pronouns for Pidge | Katie Holt, Just a dorky oneshot with no plot, Space Dad Shiro (Voltron), The plance is somehow both the focal point of the story and also barely mentioned, teenagers being teenagers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-06
Updated: 2018-08-06
Packaged: 2019-06-22 13:20:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,521
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15582876
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: Fifteen.Fifteen!Shiro had his first kiss at sixteen, forget about hickeys. He is so displeased.-Shiro goes on a mission to make sure that Pidge, his favorite teenage disaster, is okay. He may or may not be overreacting.





	always in my headspace

**Author's Note:**

> Something I want to say - teenagers are dumb and as somebody who is the same age as Pidge, I want to write a realistic depiction of what it's like being a dorky teenager in love nowadays lol - though this is obviously not from her perspective. I hope that nothing comes across as gross sexualization or anything, because, again - same age. 
> 
> I don't know if the underage warning was actually necessary for this, but I thought better safe than sorry.

Sleeping hasn't come easy since Adam. Shiro never had a problem with insomnia until he left Earth - in fact, he was always the first person to fall asleep. He'd curl an arm around Adam, close his eyes, and be out like a light. It had always been so easy.

Funnily enough, Shiro never used to have nightmares. Hell, he never even used to dream. Now, every night is riddled with them. Nightly walks around the ship to make sure that everyone's situated are redundant, but they're something to do in the late hours. (Not that time really matters. The team could go to sleep at one in the afternoon every night and nothing would change.)

He exits his room about two hours after everyone first went to bed. He'd spent maybe twenty-five minutes of that time sleeping, and the rest staring at the ceiling. He might as well be productive, right? Hell, if he's lucky, maybe Hunk will be up stress-cooking or something. It's happened before. The hall outside of their personal quarters is empty. The walls aren't completely soundproof, a few snores from Hunk's room drifting through the metal. What's most interesting, though, is that one of the doors has been slid open.

Shiro heads towards the open door before he even really thinks about it. It's Pidge's room. She's always up at some odd hour, fixing some gadget or running searches on her family members. Shiro, for the most part, lets her off with gentle requests to sleep. As long as she doesn't fall asleep in her lion or anything, he doesn't think that it's doing that much harm. They do have quite a few rest days in between big fights, not that Pidge uses those to sleep, either.

Nearing the room leads to the sight of Pidge standing in the doorway. She doesn't look like she's just awoken - in fact, far from it. Her eyes are wild and her cheeks are dark, perhaps red from the overexertion. When she sees him, she flails - hands going from her neck, to the air, to rigidly down to her sides. As messy as the rest of her room, which is currently covered in robot parts and papers and trash. "Shiro," she says, trying to whisper but failing. Her voice cracks. _She's hiding something_ , Shiro immediately thinks. He's sure it's nothing too awful, but it's enough to make him suspicious.

"Pidge," he answers, gentle. Maybe she'd been on a walk after a nightmare and is too embarrassed to admit it. "Why are you up so late?"

"Oh, you know me," Pidge says. Her voice is higher than normal. "Silly Pidge, always up late working on projects. I've been up in my room, cramming on this adjustment to Greenie's scanner."

Shiro narrows his eyes. It would make sense, if not for the fact that she's talking in the same tone of voice she uses when complimenting Hunk's occasional cooking failure. "Why are you standing in the open doorway if you've been in here all night?"

"Er, it's cooler out in the hallway?" Pidge responds, but she phrases it like it's an educated guess.

Shiro softens. "Pidge," he says, quiet, "if there's anything you want to talk about - Matt, your dad? - I'm here, okay?"

The look that Pidge gives him, full of poorly-hidden bewilderment, shows him that he's guessed wrong. She takes a step back. "Oh, Shiro, that's really nice of you! Thanks! I think I'm just going to head to bed, though-"

Her step back leads her directly under the fairy lights hung up on her walls. They shine down on her, giving Shiro a clearer view. Her mouth is in a firm line, and on her neck -

Shiro stills, and moves before even thinking about it. "How'd you get that bruise?" he asks. For a second, a blissful second, that's all it is. A bruise. Sure, a neck is a weird place to get one, but they wear helmets and armor - it's easy to get bruises in weird places. However, before he can touch it, Pidge jerks away, her entire face going as red as her cheeks.

"I - uh, I -"

Shiro gets it a second too late. "Pidge," he says, and he definitely doesn't squeak, no, not at all - "tell me that that is not a hickey."

"It's not a hickey," Pidge says, immediately, even though they both know that it is. "It's - it's not a big deal!"

Shiro's mind skips from A to B to Z. "Who did it? Are you okay? Did you say no?" He goes through the names of all the people on the ship. It must have been one of the teenage boys. He never would have pegged any of them for that type, but it's always the nice boys that end up really needing an ass kicking.

Pidge splutters. "Oh quiznak, Shiro! Of course I was fine with it! I'm okay! I'm not gonna tell you who it is, because you'll kill h-" she cuts off. "Because you will be angry. Please, Shiro, don't go interrogating! What if you interrogate the wrong one, and then everyone thinks I'm some - some bimbo!"

Fifteen. _Fifteen!_ Shiro had his first kiss at sixteen, forget about hickeys. He is so displeased. 

"You're not a bimbo," Shiro says, the mere thought of associating Pidge with that word ridiculous. "Tell me who-"

"No!" Pidge says, voice going up to an incredibly high pitch, "no, Shiro, I cannot, because I am going to bed! Goodbye!" She puts her tiny hands on his chest and pushes him out of the room, letting the doors shut between them.

Shiro rubs his forehead with his left hand, somehow even more exhausted than he was before. He wishes that he could somehow forget that the last five minutes ever happened, but at the same time, he  _can't._ He has to make sure that whatever is happening with Pidge is leaving her safe. That's what matters.

* * *

**SHIRO'S SUSPECT LIST:**

Hunk: Pidge's closest friend. Could have courted her with food? However, there was that Balmera Shay.

Lance: Flirts with literally everybody. Is he all talk?

Keith: Most likely of the first three, since he's actually mature. Pidge did call him a loner the other day, though. 

Allura: Don't know her age, but isn't she too old for Pidge? Does she even like girls?

* * *

 

Shiro, not knowing what else to do, goes to Allura. She seems to be the least likely, mainly because he's only ever heard her and Coran mention past male suitors, never female. Plus, the princess knows enough of what happens on the ship, due to the mice and her own excellent ears. He'll grant Pidge the fact that having this be a widespread rumor would just be mortifying for the poor kid, and he's pretty sure that anyone but Allura would gossip.

He meets her in the lounge the next morning, when all of the teenagers are most definitely still sleeping. She's perched in the middle of the seats, distinguished as ever, with her hands folded neatly in her lap. "Shiro," she greets him, before he even gets the chance to say anything, "you look unsettled. Would you like to talk about something?"

"Morning, Princess," he says instead, because he's not entirely sure how to start. He slowly makes his way towards her, unsure of where to sit."There's something that I want to talk to you about. Nothing life-threatening, don't worry, but something about the team."

Allura's lips tighten. "Okay," she says. "No one's thinking of leaving, I hope?"

"No, no," Shiro says, taking the seat next to her. "I'm worried. About Pidge." He briefly and quietly explains the encounter that he'd had the previous night. "I don't usually gossip or involve myself in stuff like that, but she's so  _young,_ and I'm worried that one of the teammates might be taking advantage."

Allura somehow softens and hardens at once. "Oh, quiznak," she says, "I assumed that with so many young people, something like this would happen at some point. I didn't really consider Pidge, though." For a moment, there's a silence, and then she continues. "I think that Pidge is a really intelligent girl. I don't think that she would  _allow_ anybody to take advantage of her. She and the others aren't  _too_ far apart in age, are they? She's nearing sixteen, and the others are seventeen?"

Shiro opens his mouth and closes it. It feels weird, being speechless. He tries to think back to when he was in high school - he'd had a friend who had become involved in nonplatonic encounters at a rather young age, right when they were entering secondary school. He had been amused by it then, but that was ten years ago, back before he'd realized how much people  _age._ "Lance and Hunk are seventeen, Keith is eighteen," he says.

"Oh, well," Allura says, "I had a talk with Keith the other day about how he felt guilty he didn't know Pidge at all. I would assume that means he's not involved here."

That relaxes Shiro enough. He trusts Keith to the point where he would be disappointed if anything sneaky like this occurred with him. He can handle Hunk or Lance, but he doesn't want Keith to feel like his position is being undermined.

"It's still..." Shiro struggles to find words. He's verbose when it comes to delivering orders or pep talks, but talking about the love life of someone who he views as a sister? It's horribly uncomfortable. "I told her brother that I would keep her safe. I don't feel as though I'm keeping that promise if I don't at least say anything to her about it."

"I think talking to her is a good idea," Allura says. "Though - she's a teenager. As smart as she is, teenagers are stubborn. She'll do whatever she wants, no matter what you say. Instead of interrogating her, try... vocalizing support. I know it's uncomfortable, but wouldn't you rather have her be able to talk to us about it if something happens?

Shiro would rather not have to worry about any of this at  _all,_ but of course Allura has a point. "I'll talk with her. Thanks, Allura."

"Anytime," Allura says, and the wistful look on her face tells Shiro that she's thinking of her past. It must be weird, feeling like her adolescence is simultaneously recent and long, long ago.

* * *

 

Shiro finds Pidge in the hangar bay for the Green Lion. He expects her to be hacking away at something, or working on an adjustment for the lion, but she's just sitting on the floor cross-legged. She instinctively looks up when he opens the door, but looks back down, embarrassed, when she realizes that it's him.

"Sorry to interrupt your Pidge time," Shiro says, lighter than he feels, "but do you mind if I talk to you for a bit?"

"Yes," Pidge says, but in a tone that shows she's not entirely serious. She pats the spot on the floor next to her. He rather ungracefully slumps to the ground, the tile cold through his uniform.

For a moment, neither of them talk. Shiro knows that he's expected to talk first. "Matt always talked about how smart you are," Shiro says. Pidge scoffs. "I'm serious! He never had anything bad to say about you. I thought that it was funny, actually. What sibling  _doesn't_ smack talk their younger sister?"

"Matt, I guess," Pidge says. "Sure, I annoyed him sometimes, but he's always been my biggest fan." She pauses for a second, probably not having expected the conversation to go this route. "I was his, too. Always."

"He knew, at one point, that things were getting dangerous," Shiro says, willing down the more tragic memories. "He told me that if I got out... to find you. Keep you safe. Of course, we'd thought that that would entail checking up on you after school, not this."

"I think I prefer this," Pidge says.

"Oh, high school is hell," Shiro says, if not only for the sake of agreeing with her. He actually had an alright time in high school, perhaps due to the fact that he was in the closet and not a target for bullying. "I think that I would prefer this too."

"At least here, I can  _use_ what I learn, instead of being made fun of."

Shiro, unfortunately, did not come here to talk about high school. "Pidge... I know you're smart. You're the smartest person I've ever met, I swear. I'm sorry if I pried, earlier. I just want to make sure that you're staying safe."

"Shiro..." she trails off. "I'm fine, genuinely! I'm sure that none of the horror scenarios that you're dreaming up are even happening. I just - for  _once,_ I get to be a stupid teenage girl. And - I know objectively how young I must seem, but I don't  _feel_ young at all. I feel old. Grandma old."

Shiro, somehow, knows exactly what she's talking about. "Just - look, Pidge, I know how uncomfortable this is, so I won't pry again, okay? Won't even ask who. Just promise me that you're being safe so that I can pretend this never happened." He says the last part mainly just to make her laugh, which she does. He doesn't care that much that he's having this conversation - it will be practice for the future, if they ever get back to Earth. If Adam ever forgives him...

"I promise," Pidge says. "And if anything shitty ever happens, I'll come to you or Allura."

"Perfect," Shiro says, overwhelmingly relieved. "Alright, I'll get out of your hair now. I hope everything works out, okay?"

Her eyes shine brightly. "Thanks, Shiro. I think that they will."

* * *

 

Shiro finds out who it is anyway. Not on purpose or anything, since he  _had_ promised her that he wouldn't pry, but there's only seven of them. It's easy to figure these things out.

A week after his talk with Pidge, he's walking towards the personal quarters after deciding it was time to attempt sleep for the night. He's barely in the hallway when he hears a plethora of noises. There's Hunk's snoring like usual, but coming from Lance's room is the sound of old school video game music and laughter. There's Lance's laugh, fast and uncontained, and then there's Pidge's, which seems to be bordering on hysterical.

Shiro smiles and hesitates by the door. It's good that they can still have fun playing video games during all of this. Maybe this positivity and lightheartedness could even help Shiro relax tonight.

"Oh,  _Lance,_ you jackass," he hears Pidge say. "I almost got that one!"

"Sorry, Katie," is the response. "It's kill or be killed!" The laughter from both of them continues again, but is cut off abruptly. "Oh, no fair, you can't kiss me every time I'm winning!"

... So much for relaxing.

"Why not?"

"Because it's unfair!"

"What's  _unfair_ is you changing the controls on my controller so that you could win!"

Shiro takes a deep breath and walks away. It's not all that surprising, really, though he  _does_ kind of wish it was Hunk.

**Author's Note:**

> this was supposed to be funny but just ended up being heart-to-hearts


End file.
